Splintered Soul
by troiandisorder
Summary: A short story which follows Spencer, who is once again in Radley following the events of a major, game changing, A move. As she once again finds herself at rockbottom, she is forced to deal with what it is that has got he there.. a choice she made and as such the implications of that choice. Is she ready to face the past, or has A finally won?
1. Chapter 1

_memoirs of a broken mind_

A choice is a most curious thing. It holds the balance of wrong and right, in its grasp. The ability to alter the future and put into motion a significant play of events. The forging of tomorrow is in its power. Sometimes it's necessary to make choices that we disagree with, for the opportunity cost is of lower value. Sometimes the decision is a difficult one, other times quite the contrary.

Growing up, we are taught proverbial such as that of which the choices are a judgment of the individuals we are. One wrong decision, and we could go up in flames. But what happens when the wrong choice is made? When the people you love are put at harm's way? When there is no alternative but revenge. And they say, that, vengeance is a dish best served cold. But remember, before you embark on a journey of revenge dig two graves. One for your victims and the other for yourself...

Spencer Hastings stared out of her window, watching as the clouds parted to make way for a waterfall of rain. The heavy liquid smashing itself against the window as lightening brightened the sky, allowing her to see the hoodied figure outside. Slowly they looked up, until they were staring at Spencer from beneath the cover of their hoody. Mona. Sure enough here to make sure that everything had gone smoothly. The figure made its way to thebuilding, and placed a key into a hole just under the window, before retreating back into the dark night. Their hoody merging into the pitch black, as if they were never here.

Spencer returned to her bed, her hands grabbing the pillow from beside her and reaching into the inside of the case to pull out her black hoody. Staring at it, she recollected the events of the day in her mind. How could she do that? What could have drove her to commit such a sin? Was it a need for revenge or a spur of the moment event? She know better.

A trickle of a tear made its way down her cheek... her mind replaying cheap slogans she had been taught in her earlier life. Two wrongs do not make a right. Two wrongs do not make a right. On the contrary, life never is that simple is it?

*Earlier*

Spencer's eye flashed opened, her heart beating rapidly. Lights burned her eyes... Where was she? She reached out to protect her face from the light's glare, and nearly doubled over when she saw the crumpled figure of Aria beside her. 'Aria,' she cried. 'Aria, what's wrong? Aria where are we?' she cried frantically, tugging at her unconscious body. Tears streamed down her face. What was happening? Was this some twisted nightmare? Thousands of possibilities overcrowded her mind, but now wasn't the time to focus on that. Her best friend needed her and that was all she could think about!

She rose to her feet and looked around, locating a door she ran up to it and started banging on it. 'Help. Someone body, help!' she screamed. Her throat was clogging up with emotion.

Who would do this? What was happening? And most important of all, why? These questions spun around and around in Spencer's head, making her thoughts go awry and flinging her into a state of denial and shock. Was this for real?

She lifted Aria's head with what little strength she had left, and placed it gently into her lap. Covering herself over the unconscious body, she cried and listened to its heartbeat.

Spencer couldn't really remember what happened from that moment on... all that she could recall was a sharp buzzing, ringing in the air, and glancing up in time to witness the doors slide open. She could remember laying Aria's body carefully on to the cold floor and running through the door to look for help. She could recollect memories of finding herself in an empty corridor, the walls an impassive white, and the floor a narrow surface. She remembered screaming for help and doubling over and she remembered the door closing behind her, and with it hope. She could summon up fragments of memories wherein she heard the piercing ringing of a phone and looking to her left to find it's source. She picked up the phone and opened its screen to find a text... the format of one she knew all too well. '_How about we play a little game? I'm feeling particularly lucky today! Kisses, -A." _

Spencer looked down at the screen, struggling to comprehend its meaning. Her hands shaking, she dropped it, as she once again resumed her call for help. She forced herself to her feet and turned back, making her way to her best friend's side, but it was too late. From the moment she endeavours to open it, and collapsed beside the door. She could remember opening her eyes and seeing white, cloudy, smoke rising into the corridor, slowly choking her. And from there, her memory truly was appalling.

The last memory she could successfully recollect was the blonde in the redcoat... the infamous A who had been targeting them for several years now.. She could just about picture her hoodied face as she walked past her, slowly bending down to examine her weakened body, under the cover of her hoody.

Spencer's next memory was of her in a white gown, wondering an empty hallway. She could feel the weakness of her knees, as they buckled under the pressure of her body. Her heart was racing as the events of the evening began flooding her brain. She found herself heading towards the floor and caught onto a nearby trolley, steadying herself under its strength. She looked at it carefully and saw that it had an array of surgical instruments carefully placed on top of it, and next to them lay the phone she had depicted in her lifelike dreams. She grasped it with her left hand and attempted to call 999. On the third dial, she reached an answering machine, which occurred to her as fairly abnormal. Nonetheless, what she found even weirder was the voice on the answering machine, which sounded like the cry of a baby or the programmed voices in a kid's doll... '_Nice try Spence, but you're mine now. Nice try Spence, but you're mine now,_' it repeated, steadily. Spence dropped the phone in shock... What in god's name was happening?

She spun around to her left and found herself staring at the room she had earlier found herself and Aria unconscious within. All she could make out in the heavy darkness was the back of a chair, and a head full of dark brown hair... then, at that precise moment, the phone she had dropped earlier began to ring. '_ROUND ONE: give me the location of Mona's RV, or one of your friends goes bye bye. Kisses, -A'._

Suddenly, several rooms across the hallway were burst with illumination, including the one she was standing outside. Spencer circumspectly peered in and found herself gazing at the generic silhouette of a figure in a black hoody, as it made its way to the chair and spun it around. Sure enough, there was Aria. Her head limp, and resting on the shoulder of the chair. Spencer could make out several rounds of duct tape binding her mouth and hands. The figure took a stance beside Aria's body, where they produced a gun from their pockets and cocked it towards her limp head.

Before she could do anything else, Spencer heard her cry pierce the quiet afternoon/night... She couldn't tell. She doubled over and crashed into a nearby door, 5 feet from where Aria was held captive. Looking up, once more, she noticed that this room too had its lights turned on. She stared into it before realising the hoodied figure staged in the middle of a room, aiming at gun at another figure in a chair... after several moments; she was shocked to realize that the figure was, in fact... Toby Cavanaugh.


	2. Chapter 2

_sands of time_

A fly whizzed around the room, the beat of its wings heavy against the cool air. It swirled and swirled, rising and falling, looping and travelling around the bed. It lowered itself, until it was perched against the bars of the windowsill. Spencer quietly peered at it from the corner of the room, where she sat crouched in the worn out chair that had been be from even both Mona's time in this very room.

She slowly unfastened herself, and perched herself on her knees in the chair, her hand slowly extending in the air, as the fly once more resumed movement. The sound of its buzzing wings, once more reverberated around the room. Spencer grimaced, subconsciously, as she saw the blur of arm as it struck down against the fly. A blur later and the sound had reached an abrupt stop.

Spencer chuckled quietly_. It's ever so easy to kill_, she thought, her mind dragging her back to the time she spent playing A's _game_.

*earlier*

Time was going too fast. Spencer felt her heart leap from her chest, the movement causing significant pain in her torso. This was too much. Once she'd been under the impression that Toby had died, and long after she'd found out that it was a lie, her heart still ached at the memory. But what would she do if he died, for real this time. Her Toby. Gone before her eyes. Because of her. As if losing him once wan't excruciating! She could only imagine the torture she'd face for a second time. She was unsure whether she could handle it. Whether anyone could.

She looked up at him, as he stared at her. He's face confident, though she knew. he was putting on a brave face for his Spence, the girl he loved. The girl who had been through the wrath of A for years now. It was nothing more than a facade, for her. He smiled at him, before the figure in black smacked the butt of the gun into his face. 'NOO,' she screamed, but it was too late. When he next looked up, she saw blood dripping from the side of his mouth... staining his shirt.

Tears streamed down her cheek, powered by anger and remorse. Toby was hers, what made this intruder think that they could touch him? She pulled herself from the floor, dusting her clothes. If A wanted to play dirty, she wouldn't give in. These were the people she loved and cared about, and if A thought that they could use them as pawns from a game of chess... they were wrong. She wouldn't let them. This was her family. She made her way to end of the corridor, quietly peering into everyone of the rooms for which had lighting. Each was inhabited by a black hoody and the faces of those she considered loved ones: Melissa, Aria, Hanna, Emily and Toby.

She felt her chest rising with indignation and determination. A was about to play it her way.

' _YOU WANT THE RV, DO YOU?'_ she shouted up at the ceiling. _'THEN YOU'R GOING TO HAVE TO RELEASE ALL OF THEM. YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO PLAY IT MY WAY. And you wonder why? I have nothing to lose. You have taken all that I love and used them to force my hand. Bad play. You know what they say... the most dangerous of us all is one who has lost everything.'_ Silence, it consumed the whole building, tightening its grip against the air and causing the pressure to harden Spencer's breathing.

A few more painful moments passed, before the phone started ringing beside her. The caller ID was as expected: BLOCKED NUMBER. She reached out and grabbed the mobile, answering the call. The next words she heard were hard to make out, against the loud/deep noise produced by the voice alternator. 'Clever Spencer,' the voice sounded almost amused. 'Well, I believe we should change the rules. Give me the RV, and I'll let you friends go on the condition that they each do me a favour. Think of it as an exchange. Are you willing to comply?' even under the scrambled mess of that she heard, she could tell that the voice sounded arrogant. It knew that she had no other choice, and that was the truth. 'Yes,' she replied tonelessly. 'Remember Spencer,' the voice spoke dangerously... almost as if it knew something she didn't. 'I do this not because your words have me concerned,, but that you have something I want. And next time you try to force my hand, things will not turn out half as pretty'. The phone cut abruptly.

Spencer looked up, her face bright with a smile. She couldn't believe she had succeeded, but before she had time to tell her friends the smile fell off her face. She found herself staring as the white mist once more surrounded her, tugging at her mind until she fell, unconscious.

Spencer found herself back in her room, in Radley, as the door of her room was pushed open. Aria walked in, her face searching for Spencer's and when she found it, she smiled. 'I thought you might be lonely,' she breathed out as she took a seat by her best friend. 'How're you doing, Spence?' she inquired in a friendly fashion. Spencer looked up at her, half-mindedly and smiled reassuringly. 'I'm fine, Aria, how're you? Is everyone doing well?' Aria cast a glance at her, before deciding against answering her question. 'Don't worry about us, we're good. It's you that we're worried about.' This caught at Spencer, her chest recoiling at her words. She hated being treated like this. As if she were fine china or brand new cutlery. This wasn't her.

'Aria, stop. I don't need you fawning over me... I'm o—'

'You're not okay, Spence. You need to get over this. It wasn't your fault. You didn't make him betray us like that. He wasn't on our side all this time. He deserved what he got.'

'No one deserved that, Aria'.

'He was in league with her, with red coat'.

'I should've known, okay. Right from the moment that I found that doll. From the moment he escorted me. I should've known it was him!' The memory of the moment engulfed her, transporting her back in time.

She woke up, her head aching from being knocked out. She pulled herself into a sitting position and looked around her. She was in a car. Alone. Her hands scrambled with the door, but it was locked. On the dashboard was a creepy doll, once she seen once before... she knew what it meant. She picked it up slowly and pulled on the string. Waiting for the doll to give her instructions. _Waiting for a doll to give her instructions_, what had her life come to?

A voice exploded from the doll, enveloping her in it's wrath, and for a brief moment in time Spencer thought about how such a small and childish toy could have such a loud and impossibly deep voice. 'Spencer. Spencer. You have 4 hours to put the RV in my possession. The sands of time are already falling.'

Spencer looked at the watch strapped around her wrist: it was 14:09. She had until 6pm. She knew where she had to go... Toby – it hurt to think of him, the memory of his callused fingers stroking the skin on her back was like a knife to the chest- had once told her that he'd hidden the RV in one of the parking lots of a motel he'd once lived in... Motel Derenhale. She put the car into motion and lurched forwards, turning the corner to morph with the rest of the assemble of cars and vehicles...


	3. Chapter 3

_ATONEMENT:_

It was only when Spencer tuned into the mud path that she realised that she had a tail. At first she dismissed the thought, but looking into the mirror all she could see was the black SUV with the tinted windows. Now Spencer knew that the right thing to do was to leave, and to do what was asked of her, but this was necessary. She needed this for herself.

She threw the door open and ran out of the truck, making her way to the bottom of the trail. The place she'd once seen Toby's dead body. The place she had decided that she couldn't take it anymore... that it was too painful. The last time she was here, in the confusion of the moment and the excruciating grip of the day's events, she had left a bracelet her. It was very old, but it was a treasured keep, nonetheless. Ali had given it to her when she'd won her fifth grade, and surely there it was. Tucked under the cover of the thick tree, it gleamed despite the dirt covering it.

She bent down to pick it up, when she noticed the figure emerging from the tree. Spencer's heart began to beat faster and faster... What was happening? And then he emerged. Caleb.

'Spencer? Spence, what're you thinking about now?'

Spencer's eyes peered at Aria, from the corner of her face. 'About that story, you know the one. Fourth grade, Ms Templeton's class... about the girl who was too scared to go out, for she was plagued by the torments the outer world would bestow upon. She stayed in her cottage, every night and every day. Alone. She grew bitter.'

'Spence, why are you thinking about that?' aria asked nervously, worry building its way into her forehead.

'Because we forgot Aria!' Spencer snapped. 'We told ourselves that A was only strong because we were frightened of them, because we were letting ourselves fall victim to them! That's why! If it was for that...A wouldn't have been forced to take us, to fo0rce our hand...'

'If it wasn't for us, you wouldn't have nearly ruined Ezra's life! And I... I wouldn't have had to find out.'

'Spencer, t wasn't your fault. You not knowing wouldn't have made a difference, he still would've been A! And as far as Ezra goes, I had no choice! A would've killed us, you saw what he did to him.'

'Look, Spence. I had no choice. A had exactly where the bitch needed us. Separated. Hanna and Emily being forced to contact Mona... who had coincidentally run off to Paris, in hopes of getting her back to Rosewood. And I, I was tasked was... I had to inform the police about Ezra,' Aria broke out, tears streaming down her face as if it was a waterfall. 'I had to break the heart of the one I love most, and if it wasn't for you... God knows where he would be!' 'I'd rather not be with him, than have him arrested.. than to have A take him away from me. It's not like A hasn't taken away everything I love, already. I need you guys. I need you Spence. C'mon. We're Team Sparia... Spence?'

'I love you, you that right?'

Spencer's palm reached to touch Aria's wrist. 'Spence, if it weren't for you... if you hadn't thwarted A's game... I down know how long Lucas could've helped me out for!'

This caught at Spencer, what could Lucas have done or known to help Aria?

'Lucas?'

'Urm, yeah. He was my black hoody... Once I had received my doll, who told me that I had to inform the police about Ezra, he was the one who was responsible for checking up on me... But instead, he took me to his house and helped me with my concussion... He saved my life. And he bought me enough time for you to save Ezra. I owe you, for him. And for me.'

'But, I'm a terrible person' sniffled Spencer.

'No! You are the strongest, most resilient individual I know! And if it wasn't for you...'

'I need to atone.'

'**Atonement is for those of us who are weak'. **

'Aria, I killed a man. A bad man at the least, but I killed someone...' Spencer's face reddened.. Tears trickled down her face. Her chest repeatedly concaving on her lungs, as if her body was collapsing in on itself.

'Caleb?'

'Spencer, you have a tail. We can't speak for long, but A's got Hanna and Emily chasing after that Mona. Whatever A wants with Mona, that RV is what's going to lead them to it! Do you understand? I need to give something to you! Look, Hanna's told me as much as she knows but it seems as if A is using you to do their dirty work... You need to buy us as much time as you've got, whatever Mona did... If she really did kill Wilden.. who knows? But you need to take this Spence!'

Caleb retrieved a small handgun from his pocket, placed it in Spencer's palm and kissed her on the check. A moment later he was gun, and as she made her way to the truck, all she saw was a black hoody waiting for her. It bent it's head respectively as her arrival and indicated a black glove to the truck. She understood. Red Coat was getting impatient. Follow me, I'll take you to it. And tll her to meet us at Motel Derenhale in Ravenswood.


End file.
